France

The French hotel industry largely stalled in 2016, hit by the dramatic security situation and, as in all even-numbered years, an unfavourable events calendar with the absence of the Paris Air Show and Vinexpo in Bordeaux. At national level, according to the figures announced by Deloitte In Extenso,...

At a press conference at the beginning of December, Didier Robert, President of the Réunion region, and Marie-Joseph Malé, CEO of Air Austral, congratulated each other on a historic event: for the first time in the island's history, a non-stop flight is about to link St Denis de la Réunion to the Chinese city of Guangzhou...

GETTING THERE The SNCF serves Dijon from Paris with around fifteen daily return TGV services, some of which stop at Montbard. Journey time: 1 hour 35 minutes. Internet: www.sncf.com FOR MORE INFORMATION Comité Régional du Tourisme Bourgogne/Franche-Comté La City - 4, rue Gabriel Plançon. 25044 Besançon Cedex Internet: www.bourgogne-tourisme.com HOTELS [caption id="attachment_52555" align="aligncenter" width="700"]...

The future of Marseille is just a ten-minute walk from the Old Port. Its HQ: the Joliette docks, a long series of warehouses where bright offices have taken the place of containers. It's a radical change of destiny for a district that until now had symbolised the city's industrial and port history. The...

They will discover a setting that seems to have come straight out of a 3-D project, an urban planner's dream full of new-generation buildings, large mineral masses and green spaces. "Paris Rive Gauche" is the name given to this major project stretching from the Gare d'Austerlitz to the Paris ring road. Launched in 1994...

La Grande Catherine, a trendsetter? In her own way. By welcoming Diderot to her court and buying Voltaire's library after his death in 1778, she set in motion a fashion that is still very much in vogue in the Russia of 2010: that of French belles choses. Admittedly, France no longer dominates the...

The main road that cuts through the pine forest gives access to buildings that are buried deep in nature, the whole being located around fifteen kilometres from Antibes, in a very strong smell of conifers where cicadas rustle. "Sophia Antipolis is 1,300 companies and 30,000 employees united by the same desire to...

How did the idea of completely restoring Le Negresco come about? Nicole Spitz - Negresco will celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2012. So it was a fantastic opportunity to bring it into the 21st century. We undertook a complete renovation in line with our eco-palace approach, with the agreement of Madame Augier, the famous owner, who decided to...

How would you define Euroméditerranée? Paul Colombani - Euromed, managed by the Établissement public d'aménagement Euroméditerranée (EPAEM), is a project of national interest that was launched in 1995, at a time when the French government was beginning to feel the need for a Mediterranean capital. This vast project is financed to the tune of 50 % by the French government and in part by the city of Marseille,...

Today, Euromed is brimming with projects, some underway, others nearing completion. Like the CMA CGM tower, the first of Marseille's future skyline, served since March by the Quais d'Arenc tram station. This is a central point in the district, and other skyscrapers by Jean Nouvel, Yves Lion and Baptiste Piétri will soon be springing up.

How does the Grand Port Maritime de Marseille intend to continue to stand out on the world stage? Jean-Claude Terrier - By diversifying the products we receive. In addition to crude oil, we are adding refined petroleum products, biofuels and, above all, liquefied natural gas, with a terminal currently in the start-up phase and a future one currently under appraisal....

Is one hundred and eighty million euros invested in hotels in Cannes a huge amount? Michel Chevillon - Despite the crisis, we have continued to invest. Admittedly, we don't have any new hotels, but the refurbishments are phenomenal. In three years, 1,000 of the 5,500 rooms in our hotel portfolio have been renovated. How have these investments been able to...

Even if, of course, all the purely 'business' ingredients are present. "It's a very accessible city where business travellers can find all the skills and talent they're looking for", continues Carole Zerah. And with good reason: in 2008, no fewer than 440 trade fairs and 900 congresses were held in Paris. The capital is...

The completion of the major urban project launched in 1996 has revolutionised the image of the city and, further afield, of an urban community of 6060,000 inhabitants extending as far as Mérignac, Bègles and Pessac. The three tramway lines, the development of the quays, the grooming of the facades in the historic centre and the regeneration of the Bastide district, on the outskirts of...

France's second-largest business district after La Défense": this is how the Greater Lyon urban community describes the Part-Dieu district, located on the left bank of the Rhône in the heart of the third arrondissement of the capital of Gaul. With its 1.5 million square metres of tertiary sector activity, 40,000 jobs, 1125...

Immobile, backward-looking, irreformable... this is the sad portrait of France in 2006 as seen by the bitter prophets of hexagonal decadence. They are quick to forget that behind its noisy nostalgia and its taste for the most vindictive slogans, France also knows how to evolve in silence. And this is even truer for its...

2.3 million square metres of living space spread out - or rather piled up - over 300 hectares, between the city centre and the airport: the Zuidas district, to the south of Amsterdam, is probably one of the most ambitious urban projects in Europe. Better still: Zuidas is no longer a project, it's already a reality. And although it will be a quarter of a century before...